$30.00 AUD

Australia is poised at a critical moment of its history - but the time to act is now. Since publishing Talking to My Country in early 2016, Stan Grant has been crossing the country, talking to huge crowds everywhere about how racism is at the heart of our history and the Australian dream. But Stan knows
this is not where the story ends. Everywhere he goes, he is asked the same questions: What can we do? How can we change the story?
In The Urgency of Now, Stan weaves a story of history, memoir, politics, struggle, survival and hope. Expressing a cautious optimism, he wants to show us that there is something we can all do, that there is a path forward, a way towards true reconciliation. For Stan, the creation of the Australian nation and the repression of the indigenous people is integrally woven together. He has long been fascinated by the history of Jimmy Governor - also a part-Aboriginal Wiradjuri man - a man who was pushed to intolerable limits. Found guilty of murder, he was sentenced to hang, but the execution date was delayed by almost two months due to planned festivities to celebrate Australian Federation. Jimmy Governor was finally hanged at Darlinghurst gaol on 18 January 1901, just days after the official birth of the Australian nation.
But Stan believes that with the recent establishment of the Referendum Council on constitutional recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and the coming referendum, there is a huge opportunity facing Australia - an opportunity to fix past wrongs and set an optimistic path for the future and true reconciliation. It's the right thing to do. But we have to do it NOW....Show more

$25.00 AUD

The 2011 post code of Sydney's inner east offers a fascinating history of high life, low life and, sometimes very low life. All five precincts are alive with history and surprising stories. Ride the scenic roller-coaster over the forgotten White City at Rushcutters Bay; see the naughty boys waving their
willies at the ferries approaching Woolloomooloo bay; chase 'peeping Toms' in Elizabeth Bay; tap to the tunes of cabaret's greats at the Silver Spade, Potts Point, or dare to be different in yesterday's Kings Cross. Cultural Historian, Warren Fahey, delivers an eclectic romp through the social history of Sydney's most famous neighbourhoods....Show more

$33.00 AUD

Where have I come from? From the land of rivers, the land of waterfalls, the land of ancient chants, the land of mountains... In 2013, Kurdish journalist Behrouz Boochani was illegally detained on Manus Island. He has been there ever since. People would run to the mountains to escape the warplanes and f
ound asylum within their chestnut forests... Laboriously tapped out on a mobile phone and translated from the Farsi. It is a voice of witness, an act of survival. A lyric first-hand account. A cry of resistance. A vivid portrait through five years of incarceration and exile. Do Kurds have any friends other than the mountains? PRAISE FOR NO FRIEND BUT THE MOUNTAINS "A chant, a cry from the heart, a lament, fuelled by a fierce urgency, written with the lyricism of a poet, the literary skills of a novelist, and the profound insights of an astute observer of human behaviour and the ruthless politics of a cruel and unjust imprisonment." Arnold Zable, author of the award-winning Jewels and Ashes and Cafe Scheherazade "In the absence of images, turn to this book to fathom what we have done, what we continue to do. It is, put simply, the most extraordinary and important book I have ever read." Good Reading Magazine "Not for the faint-hearted, it's a powerful, devastating insight into a situation that's so often seen through a political - not personal - lens." GQ Australia "It is an unforgettable account of man's inhumanity to man that reads like something out of Orwell or Kafka, and is aptly described by Tofighian as 'horrific surrealism'. It is clear from Boochani's writing that he is a highly educated and philosophical man; he segues effortlessly between prose and poetry, both equally powerful." -The Australian Financial Review Magazine "Behrouz Boochani has written a book which is as powerful as it is poetic and moving. He describes his experience of living in a refugee prison with profound insight and intelligence." Queensland Reviewers Collective...Show more

$20.00 AUD

'Dark Emu injects a profound authenticity into the conversation about how we Australians understand our continent ... [It is] essential reading for anyone who wants to understand what Australia once was, or what it might yet be if we heed the lessons of long and sophisticated human occupation.' Jud
ges for 2016 NSW Premier's Literary Awards
Dark Emu puts forward an argument for a reconsideration of the hunter-gatherer tag for pre-colonial Aboriginal Australians. The evidence insists that Aboriginal people right across the continent were using domesticated plants, sowing, harvesting, irrigating, and storing -- behaviours inconsistent with the hunter-gatherer tag. Gerritsen and Gammage in their latest books support this premise but Pascoe takes this further and challenges the hunter-gatherer tag as a convenient lie. Almost all the evidence in Dark Emu comes from the records and diaries of the Australian explorers, impeccable sources.
Bruce's comments on his book compared to Gammage's: " My book is about food production, housing construction and clothing, whereas Gammage was interested in the appearance of the country at contact. [Gammage] doesn't contest hunter gatherer labels either, whereas that is at the centre of my argument."...Show more

$70.00 AUD

The first major history of Paddington - Sydney's celebrated heritage suburb - in forty years This first major history of Paddington in forty years provides a fresh and revealing perspective on this celebrated heritage suburb in Sydney - one of the largest and most intact Victorian enclaves in the world.
Leading historians and specialists explore the makeup of Paddington's diverse community - including its Indigenous, colonial, post-war migrant, bohemian and LGBTQ residents, and a succession of gentrifiers - and discuss the evolution of the suburb's unique architecture and landscape....Show more

$35.00 AUD

Cardinal George Pell, Australia's most powerful Catholic, has been found guilty of five sexual crimes against children. Updated edition. He is the most senior Catholic figure in the world to be charged by police and convicted of child sex offences. The abuse involved choirboys at Melbourne's St Pat
rick's Cathedral. George Pell was a Ballarat boy who studied at Oxford and rose through the Catholic Church ranks to become adviser to Pope Francis and Vatican treasurer. He has been expelled from the Pope's inner circle of trusted cardinals. As an outspoken defender of church orthodoxy, supported and championed by the powerful, Pell's ascendancy was remarkable and seemingly unstoppable. The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Abuse brought to light horrific stories about sexual abuse of the most vulnerable, Pell portrayed himself as the first man in the Catholic Church to tackle the problem. But questions about what the Cardinal knew, and when, persisted. Louise Milligan pieces together decades of disturbing activities highlighting Pell's actions and cover-ups. The book is a testament to the most intimate stories of complainants. Many people entrusted their secrets to be told here for the first time. Multi-award winning Cardinalreveals uncomfortable truths about a culture of sexual entitlement, abuse of trust and how ambition can silence evil....Show more

$25.00 AUD

Dazzling, poetic and vivid storytelling from one of Australia's greatest writers, which tells the bloody, brutal and enthralling story of the epic journey of the First Fleet.
Originally published as a multi-part serial in The Australian, By Sea and Stars tells the story of the epic voyage which led to
the founding of our nation, as told from the point of view of the people who took part - willingly or unwillingly - in it. Drawing from historical sources of the time, including letters and journals, Trent Dalton, one of Australia's best writers, brings this epic voyage, and the people who went on it, to vivid life.
This is not dry history of dates and names. These are gripping stories of real people, from the lowest to the highest. From terrified nine year old chimney sweep and convict John Hudson to conscientious Lieutenant Ralph Clark, pining after his wife and son, to the brave and determined Captain-General Arthur Phillip, the brightest star of the British Navy: these are the people who made the voyage, and these are their stories - of death, duty, glory, lust, violence, escape, mutiny - and a great southern land......Show more

$35.00 AUD

It seems that not even world war could stop crime in Sydney. In fact, World War Noir confirms that war and crime - in the form of sex, drugs, alcohol, racketeering and other illicit activities - go hand in hand. A companion book to the later glory days of the Sydney underworld from Sydney Noir, here Mic
hael Duffy and Nick Hordern tell the story of a time when many Australians were not as patriotic as we have been told. With soldiers' pockets full of cash and the freedom of being on leave, criminal possibilities opened up during World War II.Told from the ground - or the gutter - up, World War Noir is a raw and broad-ranging tale that confounds expectations and reveals a grittier truth....Show more

$35.00 AUD

'People would have known about Australia before they saw it. Smoke billowing above the sea spoke of a land that lay beyond the horizon. A dense cloud of migrating birds may have pointed the way. But the first Australians were voyaging into the unknown.'
Soon after Billy Griffiths joins his first archae
ological dig as camp manager and cook, he is hooked. Equipped with a historian's inquiring mind, he embarks on a journey through time, seeking to understand the extraordinary deep history of the Australian continent.
Deep Time Dreaming is the passionate product of that journey. It investigates a twin revolution: the reassertion of Aboriginal identity in the second half of the twentieth century, and the uncovering of the traces of ancient Australia. It explores what it means to live in a place of great antiquity, with its complex questions of ownership...Show more

$30.00 AUD

For 20 years Australia has been in political denial about the seismic changes occurring in the way we power our country. Successive governments continue to tell people that power prices will fall while the lights stay on. Debate is reduced to two equally preposterous narratives: coal-fired, climate
change indifference versus an impossibly utopian renewable energy future. This nonsense swirls around an incredulous public while power prices rise, the grid is stretched, energy becomes political poison and the earth warms. How did it come to this and how can we find our way out of this mess? Matthew Warren has worked for all sides of the energy industry, is regularly attacked for being too pro-coal and too pro-renewables, and writes without fear or favour. He has been lobbying for a national climate and electricity policy for over a decade. With an entertaining and fascinating narrative, Blackout cuts through the waffle to chart the disintegration of Australia's energy security, call out what is holding us back, and plot the way for a brighter future. ...Show more

$40.00 AUD

'A tour de force.' -- Professor Rodney Tiffen Beforenewspapers were ravaged by the digital age, they were a powerful force,especially in Australia -- a country of newspaper giants and kingmakers. Thismagisterial book revealswho owned Australia's newspapers and how they used them to wield politicalpower.
A corporateand political history of Australian newspapers spanning 140 years, it explainshow Australia's media system came to be dominated by a handful of empires andpowerful family dynasties. Many are household names, even now: Murdoch,Fairfax, Symes, Packer. Written with verve and insight and showing unparalleledcommand of a vast range of sources, Sally Young shows how newspaper ownersinfluenced policy-making, lobbied and bullied politicians, and shaped internalparty politics. Thebook begins in 1803 with Australia's first newspaper owner -- a convict whobecame a wealthy bank owner -- giving the industry a blend of notoriety, powerand wealth from the start.Throughout the twentieth century, Australians were unaware that they werereading newspapers owned by secret bankrupts and failed land boomers, powerfulmining magnates, Underbelly-style gangsters, bankers, and corporate titans. Itends with the downfall of Menzies in 1941 and his conviction that a handful ofpress barons brought him down. The intervening years are packed with politicaldrama, business machinations and a struggle for readers, all while the newspaper barons are peddling power and influence....Show more